Thinking of starting an affiliate program... worth it?
 

I run a half dozen or so sites that have been profitable for a while, but membership has kind of slowed down. I've never done an affiliate program before, but I'm thinking of giving it a shot. I process through my own merchant account, so I can't do CCBill... but my membership management software has everything I need to do affiliates and I've already started setting it up.

Here are some of my sites:
ArianaClub.net
ArianaGirls.com
HotTeenBellies.com
VoreGirls.com
CrushedbyBea.com
Nicole-Starr.com
...and a few more I have in development.

I'm thinking of doing a simple 50/50 rev share to start.

So, my question is... is it worth it? Am I likely to get any affiliates for these sites? How much of a PITA is it to manage an affiliate program?

If you do start one, I hope that your sites load a bit faster. 45 seconds now and your crushing site still hasn't loaded.

i am pretty certain it will be a hard job to find out
but here is your future house as a motivation

http://www.hotelclub.com/blog/wp-con...gest-house.jpg

I would start out by doing private deals only. Go to sites who you know will be able to convert your sites.

For example, let's say you have a porn star site. Contact Free Ones and enlist them as an affiliate. Give them 60% to start, offer 70% once they start sending sales or once they have met some sort of goal. Other affiliates will see your sites being promoted and want to begin promoting as well. They will contact you and again, you can set up private deals.

This will save you a lot of time and frustration, plus get you the best affiliates right from the start.

Two things, why do you think an affiliate would trust your own tracking?

And why cant you use ccbill for affiliates and your own merchant account for your own traffic?

But to answer your question, work out what the annual revenue you expect to pay out to affiliates, then ask why not spend that to recruit staff to generate in house traffic so you can keep all the revenue and not have to give up half that cash?

The trust factor is one of my concerns. I use Amember, and it handles the entire affiliate tracking process, but I'm not sure a lot of people are familiar with it enough to trust it. I would LOVE to use CCBill, and that would definitely make it a lot easier, but they are not friendly toward my niches.

Awesome idea.

Awesome. :D Can I sign you up as an affiliate? :)

You can handle the trust issue by going with private deals. You might have to pay a little up front in these private deals, but if you believe in your product, you should have no trouble doing this. From there, you grow.

Paypal hasn't cancelled you yet?

Sure, if you`re happy with a house like this one
http://www.sticksite.com/house/paper-house(6).jpg

Also who do you process with? I mean Amember just handles the member info and forwards you to the processor. Doesn't that processor have affiliate software?
And why use Amember at all?

Jeesh, you even use the site name as the Paypal description..wth?

Not trying to attack you or anything but do people actually sign up for these clusterfucks of sites?

I have been very, very, very cautious with Paypal. They changed their ToS a year or so ago to only exclude "certain adult sites," and mine are just under the line (knock on wood). I don't do anything hardcore.

I process with First Data through a merchant account. CCBill doesn't like these niches, so I went with a private merchant account. I also use it for my mainstream businesses, so it meets my needs. Amember has First Data integration so that it handles all of the subscriptions, password resets, cancellations, etcetera... and it integrates with Joomla, so I can add personalization to my sites.

Uhm... thanks? There is a fair amount of money in microniches. I did a lot of market research and had a solid business plan before I jumped in (gotta put those MBA classes to use somewhere :pimp ).

Jesus, they seriously accept this? I will never understand how they work.

CCbill actually rejected your sites or you just think they won't approve them?
Can you share who your merchant account is?

As an affiliate I prefer CCBILL -> Verotel -> NATS -> MPA3 (the owners of MPA3 recently had my thread deleted when I brought up that they had a shaving module in the past) in that order. But NATS and MPA3 is fine if you are honest and a straight shooter. And we can usually tell whether you are honest or not in a relatively short time. The other things are make sure you convert (this goes with being honest to an extent) and it's best to set a $50 minimum but $100 is fine also.

CCBill rejected me in 2005. I know that has been a while ago, but they didn't like the vore/swallowing fetish at all. I tried again with the crushing site... even though there is NO animal crushing (it's all objects that people send in), they've had some problems with animal cruelty on other crushing sites and wouldn't go for it. I'm done with them and process through my own First Data account now.

I was thinking of a $25 minimum payout to start, at least until I can build some trust. I was also thinking of a REALLY simple payout structure... I'll process payouts once per month, and if you have at least $25 at that time, you would get a payout. I'm thinking that getting some timely payouts to early adopters could help build a good reputation and some trust... what do you think?

How does this site look as a first draft of my affiliate program? ArianaElite.com

As has been said, it's getting difficult to trust those who do their own tracking. I was just looking through my 2012 stats now, and there's some strange things going on in the non-CCBill. (Playboy and Totem are the only 2 good non-CCBill for me) I'd be happy to send some traffic over if you add CCBill.

I would love to, but I don't think they'll take me with my niche. I'm not opposed to applying with them again, but am not optimistic that they'll go for it.

Is there someone trustworthy here that I can hire to administer my affiliate program that would give it a little more credibility?

You need a email contact link on one of your sites, i can't find anywhere to contact you! email me webmaster at theheron dot net

Email sent.

I'll add a contact form to the ArianaElite.com site, but may not get it up until tomorrow. I don't like direct email links because of spam, and I'm settling in for tonight. Will be glad to answer any questions, though.

My email is aerosly (at) gmail if anyone else needs to reach me. It's almost 10 PM here, so answers may be delayed until tomorrow starting in the next couple of hours.

What do you think of Verotel assuming they would take you?

I know one of his sites I would bet a lot of money on does very well. I was going to say I make 5% of my joins from affiliates but I have a small amout of very good traffic I could send to one of your sites. It is amazing at what people are buying right now and I will be the last one laughing when I finish my new site. I have still not found a single traffic source for it yet make a killing off the niche. I don't get it

This will work and I have personal and successful experience with a similar system of affiliate marketing, although my current affiliate system is not in an adult market. Private deals work very well and restrict the number of idiots whith whom you must deal therefore getting you better and more hard working affs.

:2 cents: